The Image of You
by Andreas K N
Summary: Mysteries, magical paintings, and mind contamination. Won't risk HBP spoilers in the summary, so that's as specific as I'm willing to get. Continues directly from HBP canon, which means SPOILERS. HarryDraco slash
1. Chapter 1

**WARNING: INCLUDES HBP SPOILERS!**

_**The Image of You**_

**Chapter 1: Godric's Hollow Revisited**

'What the hell are you doing?' growled the older man, his filthy hand still on the knob of the open door.

'Ehm,' stuttered the youth, still frozen from the shock of being so suddenly interrupted. 'Painting. _Obviously_,' he added, attempting a haughty drawl, waving his brush about.

'Why?' asked the other, still in that rough growl, his feral eyes narrowing.

'Precious little else to do. Watching your nails – claws grow just doesn't hold the same allure it did the first three seconds.' The quiver in the young man's voice clashed with his mocking words.

The older man barked out hoarse laughter. 'You fear me, young Malfoy. Still worried uncle Fenrir will recruit you?'

'You wouldn't dare,' said Draco, his defiant drawl as botched as his haughty one.

'Oh, I wouldn't?' Fenrir's eyes glinted. His mouth twisted into a smile that showed far too many pointed teeth.

'You're as much his servant as I am.'

'I think not, young Malfoy. I have joined forces with your Lord because it serves my cause, whereas you are chained to him through your human weakness, the love you feel for your dear mother.'

There was a long silence. Even Draco's brush remained frozen in mid air as he stared at the leering werewolf. 'Do you _want_ something?'

Fenrir raised a bushy eyebrow. 'What are you painting?'

'A thing of great beauty,' said Draco, sticking his nose up as best he could while wishing to expose as little neck as possible.

'And what, pray tell, would that be? I'm most curious.'

Draco blinked nervously, swallowed, and unfroze to indicate the large mirror standing a few feet in front of his canvas, at an eighty degree angle to the panoramic windows behind him. Ominous specks of red paint attached themselves to the glass. 'Me. I'm – I'm making a self-portrait.'

Fenrir gave Draco a long, sweeping stare, then let out a stuttering growl. 'I always knew you were a narcissistic little sod, just like your dearly departed father.'

'My father isn't dead.' It was meant as a statement of fact, but Draco's once again frozen body betrayed an underlying doubt. Despite the brilliant early-morning sunlight reflecting off the lake outside, a chill seeped into the expansive studio.

'If he hasn't managed it yet, he'd better depart before the Dark Lord gets to him.' Fenrir grinned. 'You see, young Malfoy, I've been promised a bite, or two. The ones I'm, in return, not awarding you and your darling mother. Still, if he departs before then, I'll have bites to spare, and your usefulness won't last forever.' He bowed, swaggeringly. 'So make sure you capture all your human weakness in that portrait. It'll be a most amusing memento once you've joined the Cause.' And with that, he slunk out of the room, the door locking behind him.

Draco staggered backwards into a rickety chair, dropped his brush onto the wooden floor and drew deep, shaking breaths. The sun danced across his quivering hair and shoulders, his face in deep shadow save for a sliver of jaw and the sparkling tear trickling down it.

* * *

The wedding itself had been just as wonderful as Harry had imagined it. The whole Weasley clan had been there, except Percy, which Harry thought just as well; Molly would probably have been even more troubled by his cold presence than the lame excuse he had provided for his absence.

Fleur Delacour's family could only be described as flamboyantly French, and partially very veela, causing seemingly endless testosterone-fuelled commotion. It proved the perfect distraction, like a live performance of a silly romantic comedy, complete with pratfalls and ridiculous posing. Even Hermione was nothing but amused by Ron's idiotic strutting and lovelorn looks.

Harry, however, remained calm, never even approaching the glittering barrier that had been set up to separate veelas and wizards. This seemed to amuse Ginny, the girl friend who was no longer his girlfriend. Gazing with interest at the veelas, she'd asked him if he didn't feel their pull, if he wasn't bewitched by their dance.

'They're very pretty to look at,' Harry had replied, feeling more bemused than bewitched, 'but I'm just a bit distracted, I suppose.'

'For a moment, I thought you'd say you only have eyes for me,' Ginny said, raising her eyebrows at him. When he tried to stutter some incoherent reply, she smirked and said, 'Relax, Harry. I'm just joking. I know you've a lot on your mind. I just hoped they could help distract you – in a nice way.'

Harry pointed to the alternately fighting and posturing young men beside the barrier. 'They're distracting me, in a nice way.'

Ginny raised her eyebrows again, but said nothing. Sometimes, Harry just didn't get girls, at all.

The ceremony had passed without a hitch, because no one paid any heed to either cat-calls or the occasional scuffle and chair-throwing near the vela section. Fleur had looked radiant and Bill had shone beside her. The old Egyptian mage's chant had filled the air, inspiring an odd sensation of flying through the world, not the air, without a broom.

The young couple had made their vows and proceeded to outdance everyone during the boisterous celebrations held in a large field that had, for one night only, been convinced it was an open-air ballroom.

Yes, it had been that last golden day of peace Harry had wished for.

The following night had been another matter entirely.

* * *

Bill and Fleur had flown off to a secluded bower woven by bowtruckles and lit by a hundred voyeuristic fairies. With its imported bed, wine, and butterbeer, it had seemed the perfect sanctuary, detached from the world, in which to spend their short honeymoon.

That is, until Bill transformed.

* * *

Fleur took care to touch Bill's skin as much as possible even while ripping off his shirt and trousers, making the most of her veela charms as she let her long blond hair flow over his exposed nipples, pinning his arms to the plush bed. Bill moaned, locking his hairy, strong legs around her smooth but equally strong ones. Fleur purred and wriggled out of his grasp, reintroducing his face to two bouncy friends of hers. Bill's happy moan turned into a strangled growl.

His quick nibble came as a complete but not unpleasant surprise. Usually, that was more _her_ style. She slithered down and caught his lips in a long kiss, strengthening her hold on his squirming, bucking body.

With a growl verging on a roar, Bill rolled Fleur over and took charge in a most uncharacteristic way. Fleur squealed in shocked delight.

That delight vanished as, a while later, Bill sniggered and dug his nails into Fleur's arms as he kept them pinned to the disheveled bed. On all four, straddling her, panting, he rasped, 'Veela – _delicious_ mates. Delicious.' His eyes glinted yellow. Fleur gasped. 'And Fenrir is a _masterful_ mate. Don't you agree, little veela?'

'How?' breathed Fleur, staring in horror at features both familiar and foreign.

'What your people would call contamination, girl. A curious side-effect of being bitten by a werewolf in,' he sneered, '_human_ form. Mind contamination, a connection if you wish. And,' he leaned forward to lick her cheek, 'made so much easier during mating, my _dear_.'

Fleur, resigned and no longer squirming, glared at him. 'What do you _want_? You – you _beast_! To get inside my 'ead too?'

'Your empty head wouldn't further my cause,' leered Fenrir. 'And inside you, I have been. No, what I want is your child, a veela hybrid ready to be recruited.'

'Never!' Fleur bared her teeth and snarled.

'_Spirit_, how lovely. But, my little veela, you cannot escape me; I am forever in your husband. No charm can conceal the scent of his contaminated mind. And I am already in you too. Though not in your head.' He rubbed Bill's crotch against hers. 'The seed will but grow.' His evil grin twisted Bill's face into a thing of horror. 'And it. Is. _Mine_!'

* * *

With no memory of what had happened, Bill returned to the bower and his body to find Fleur sobbing beneath him. Not even breakfast at the Burrow with half the Order promising her protection could lessen her fear nor stem her tears.

The Fidelius Charm was suggested, but Fleur felt certain not even that would help; she believed there was no escape possible for her or the baby she carried. Though she would later gain hope and faith in her friends, the feeling that Bill and Fleur were turning into a new James and Lily Potter was one that Harry carried with him that whole day as he, accompanied by Ron and Hermione, finally returned to Godric's Hollow.

And you needn't be Sybill Trelawney to interpret that as an ominous sign.

* * *

Ireland, the green island. In Harry's case, also the island of green, cursed death. Though he took some comfort in the fact that part of that death had been Lord Voldemort's. Now it was only up to Harry to make it as permanent as that of his ill-fated parents. He would cut down every last one of the crutches Tom Riddle had used to construct his idea of immortality. He would extinguish Riddle's dark soul, piece by piece. Then, maybe, finally, he would find some semblance of peace.

'Is still don't understand why they had to move all the way out here,' shouted Hermione, her arms wound tight around Harry's torso and her hair billowing in the strong wind. After the shock of Fleur's breakfast revelation, she hadn't been at all keen on riding across the open sea on the back of Witherwings, the hippogriff formerly known as Buckbeak.

'Maybe we'll find out,' Harry replied, sounding much more optimistic than he felt.

Ron remained silent. Though he'd been the one to insist on flying instead of Apparating, the news that his brother had been possessed by a werewolf madman had hit him hard.

Not even the shifting landscape following their entry into Irish airspace inspired further conversation. The subject of the previous night's disaster had been thoroughly worn out at sea, and no one felt like appreciating the scenery. Not even Kilkea Castle drew more than an absent gaze from Hermione as it appeared in the distance.

As they landed on the Slithering Slopes and trekked across the fens to reach Godric's Hollow, they touched again on the subject of werewolf possession, but got no further than before. Stepping out from a patch of aggressive shrubbery onto the main street of the village, they were once more silent, save for some spirited swearing and mutterings of 'honestly'.

* * *

The lightly forested, amphitheatrical slopes framing the Hollow formed an irregular arch of greyish green separating the rain-glittering village and the grey-blue, almost purple sky. Harry, Hermione, and Ron drew startled looks only from a few stray cats and a small group of wannabe stray children. At eight in the evening, the streets were deserted and the storm was coming. The wind had ceased to blow and birds whispered in the bushes as Harry led the way up a steep, narrow lane, consulting the wrinkly old map in his hands.

'Are you sure you're reading that right?' asked Hermione, stepping up beside Harry and glancing at the map.

'There's not much to read. We're not in London,' muttered Harry, getting more on edge with every step taking him closer to the cottage where his parents had been murdered.

'But there's nothing up here,' said Hermione as they turned a high hedge corner and Harry came face to front with his past. Beyond what had once been a small hedge and narrow patch of lawn stood a two-storey stone cottage, overgrown with lichen and ivy. Or rather, a one-and-a-half-storey cottage, as a great deal of the upper floor had been turned into a singularly unappealing balcony – the site of the hideous crime. Harry shuddered.

'What are you looking at?' asked Ron, frowning at Harry's shaken look.

'It's,' Harry began, but saw Hermione's eyes flit oddly as they passed over the cottage. 'Can't you see it?'

'See what?'

'The cottage!'

'What co—' said Ron, but the unhelpful exchange bafflement was brought to a stop by Hermione.

'It must be protected by a Fidelius Charm too,' she said. 'The cottage, I mean.'

Ron's frown didn't ease up. 'But I thought it was just his parents who were protected.'

'Yes,' said Hermione, pursing both lips and brow, 'I thought so too. But they clearly had double protection.'

'Maybe the Fidelius Charm on the cottage was added – afterwards,' said Harry, 'to keep Muggles away – and wizards.'

'No,' said Hermione, shaking her head. 'You can see it, so that means it must have been in place when you were here, or have you been let in on the secret later?'

'Not that I know,' said Harry, shrugging.

'But why double charms?' asked Ron, glaring in the general undirection of the cottage. 'Seems like overkill to me.'

'Well,' said Hermione, gazing wistfully at the same lack of direction, 'it _would_ take care of the problem of an empty house.'

'But Lupin said the Death Eaters could look in the cottage window and still not see – my parents.'

'I suspect he was making a point. But Death Eaters aren't stupid, you know. Well, not all of them, surely. And a house that's always empty would be suspicious, especially if they'd already narrowed their search down to the Hollow. It's a sensible precaution, putting a Fidelius on the actual cottage too.'

'I suppose,' muttered Ron, 'but how are we supposed to get in then?'

Harry turned to Hermione. 'Couldn't I just – lead you in?'

'I don't think that would work. Surely, it wouldn't.'

'It's worth a try?'

Hermione hesitated, then held out her hand. 'Can't hurt, I suppose.'

Harry stepped over the remains of a wicket gate, pulling a reluctant Hermione along. She screamed. Ron grabbed her other hand, and for a few seconds, there was a confused tug-of-war between the two boys, Hermione howling in the middle. Harry let go.

Hermione staggered backwards, bent over and gasped, 'How – how dreadful!'

'You were bloody splitting her in two!' exclaimed Ron, gesticulating wildly.

'What?' said Harry, stepping back onto the lane and squinting at a Hermione who physically looked quite together.

'I,' panted Hermione, standing upright again, 'I suppose that's what it must look like – from the outside. It felt like being pulled into _nothingness_ – with every atom of my body wanting to go somewhere else.' She shuddered.

'So,' said Harry, 'not something to try again.'

'Don't even think about it.'

* * *

Hermione's and Ron's attempts to get into the cottage on their own had proved equally useless, though not painful, as they were simply transported to one side of the plot and proceeded to wade out into the surrounding meadow.

Harry had to explore the cottage on his own as his friends sought accommodations at the local inn.

* * *

Months later, the cottage was no cleaner, the grass no shorter but considerably less vivacious, and the hedge had grown still further out of control. But the cottage had not been abandoned; it remained Harry's new old home, his place of solitude and rest. The irony of his enemies having been let in on the secret, long ago, that kept his friends out was not lost on him, but he thought it unlikely he'd be attacked in the Hollow. Not yet; there were still mysteries to be solved, Horcruces to be found. If Voldemort did arrive ahead of schedule, Harry would be ready, armed with hate, anger and utter determination, but mostly with the love he could still feel lingering on the charred, blackened balcony that had once been baby Harry's – and his parents' – bedroom.

Hermione and Ron had taken up semi-permanent residence in nearby Castledermot, with Hermione spending much of her time examining hidden runes at the Abbey. None of them had returned to Hogwarts. Although the school had reopened for what would have been their seventh year, this was largely dependant on them not being there, a factor the board felt made Hogwarts less of a target for the Death Eaters. The conclusion of their education had, in short, been postponed till after the war. Hermione, whom Harry had expected would never agree to such a delay, had been the one to suggest this compromise. She felt confident there would be time after they had won to complete her NEWTs, and she wouldn't hear of anyone suggesting otherwise.

The time he didn't spend with the Order or in seemingly futile search of further Horcruces, Harry spent amid the rubble of his black balcony, looking out across the Hollow, at a world to which he, during those moments, did not exist. He studied books, pondered the prophecy, emptied his mind, doodled on old parchment, and gazed at the stars, perfectly alone – until one night he heard an unmistakable voice from his past speak up behind him.

'I would knock, but the parchment's rather soggy,' it drawled, 'and Malfoys don't squish.'

Harry jumped up from his rickety chair and spun around, wand at the ready. There was no one there.

'Show yourself!'

'Must you be so _dramatic_?'

Harry stared into the darkness of the still intact section of the cottage. 'Pull of that Cloak or I swear I'll start hexing _everything_.'

'Look. Down.'

Harry did, and backed almost clear off the edge of the cottage in pure bafflement. There, amid the rubble and his discarded doodles, lay a piece of parchment with Draco Malfoy on it – a painted, accomplished portrait Harry was sure he'd never doodled, or even drawn.

'You're – you're a painting,' Harry stuttered, regaining his balance and advancing on the parchment.

'Really? I hadn't noticed.' Malfoy's voice was parchment dry.

He was just as pale and pointed as Harry remembered, though perhaps – prettier, and with no dark shadows under his eyes. Harry crouched beside the parchment. 'What – are you doing here?' he asked, feeling rather silly for talking to what was clearly a hallucination.

Malfoy quirked an eyebrow. 'And _here_ would be?'

Harry blinked. 'Don't you know?'

'From the perspective of this particular piece of parchment, how do you _think_ the world looks?' exclaimed Malfoy. 'I'm just going on the _assumption_ that we're not _actually_ floating through _space_!'

So, thought Harry, no evil Death Eater plan to infiltrate the cottage then, presumably, possibly. Hallucination or not, Malfoy wasn't a killer, which made him delusional rather than a real Death Eater. Right? That was what Harry had come up with during his silent contemplation of the case of Draco Malfoy, but faced with the latter's sneering face, his mind seemed to go soft, his brain blurry.

'I could – pick you up?'

Malfoy hesitated. 'Just – don't shred the parchment,' he muttered, 'you homicidal maniac.'

Harry felt his face heat up. 'Look, I'm – I'm really sorry about—'

'Oh, stuff it.'

Harry picked up the parchment, rather more harshly than necessary. 'I'm – in a cottage.' He inclined the parchment towards the nearby wall.

'You mean _we're_ in a cottage, Potter. With precious little roof. Can't afford one? Did you give all your money to the Weasel then?'

Harry gritted his teeth but ignored the bait. He had more pressing concerns. 'How come you're – ehm – in a _painting_?'

'Well, obviously,' drawled Malfoy, and Harry thought he saw a shadow pass over that haughty, picture-perfect face, 'I'm dead.'

* * *

tbc

* * *

All comments welcome - from yays and nays to concrit and questions:) 


	2. Portrait of the Artist as a Young Wizard

**2. Portrait of the Artist as a Young Wizard**

'What do you mean, Malfoy's dead?' asked Hermione, lowering the book she'd been perusing as Harry burst through the door of her room at the Hollow inn.

'How do you know?' Ron asked, perking up from his sprawl across the sofa.

'He's here!' said Harry, rummaging through his satchel.

'_Ew_!' exclaimed Ron. 'I don't want to see Malfoy _parts_; not together, and definitely not – split up!'

Hermione hugged the book to her chest, eyes widening. 'What—?'

'Did you have to _crumple_ me?' huffed the piece of parchment Harry pulled from his satchel.

Harry sneered at the distorted image of Malfoy. 'If I could erase your _nose_, I would! And I can hardly punch a piece of parchment in the face, can I?'

'Oh, do try. Maybe you'll get a papercut.'

'Don't push it!'

'Want me to pull your leg instead?'

'Want me to stomp on you?'

'Harry!' Hermione barked. '_What's going on?_'

Harry scowled. 'He started it.'

Hermione rolled her eyes. 'Not _that_! Why would you say he's – _dead_?'

'He says he is.'

'And you _trust_ him?' Ron exclaimed, jumping off the sofa. 'Can't you see the little sod is _spying_ on us? Burn the parchment _now_ is what I say!'

Malfoy snorted. 'You mean that's what you're shouting at an incredibly annoying pauper's pitch? Just because burning parchment is the only way you can afford to heat that dungheap you call a home, there's no call for torching your betters.'

'BETTERS?' shrieked Ron, going for the parchment as Harry surprised himself by blocking his friend's clawing attack. 'LET ME AT HIM! Rat-faced little git! I'll just rip him a _little_ bit! Harry, _come on_!'

'RONALD WEASLEY, calm _down_!'

Hermione's hands were on firmly her hips, also known as the launching pads for painful slaps. Ron calmed down quickly, if with some blatant effort.

'For one horrible moment, I thought I heard "I'll jus' strip 'im" there,' Malfoy muttered. 'You keep that kinky kook away from me!'

'Shut up!' snapped Hermione, hands twitching.

'Now, is that any way to treat a dead person?'

'You're not DEAD! I'm _talking_ to you, though I honestly don't know why!'

'And of course, you've _never_ talked to a dead person before,' Malfoy drawled.

'Well, you're just a talking picture! There are any number of reasonable—'

'A talking portrait who just insulted the Weasel with no small amount of wit, wouldn't you say, hm?'

Hermione looked about to say that she wouldn't, but then her face fell and she turned white as a very blotchy sheet. Ron, focused wholly on Malfoy, didn't notice.

'I'd say you're a sneaky little bastard who likes tricking people!'

Harry nodded in agreement, though he felt it wise to keep quiet on the subject of Malfoy's general state of corporeal animation. Hermione looked as if she was just about to solve a particularly pesky puzzle, and Harry knew better than to interfere.

Malfoy's left eyebrow wavered as it rose past a crease in the parchment. 'True, in a crude sort of way, although I am a sneaky little magical portrait, and those only come to life—'

'—once the – person is – dead,' Hermione filled in.

'But,' said Harry, 'how do we know this isn't just a – an ordinary picture, like a photograph. They move.'

Ron nodded. 'Yeah!'

'But they don't talk,' said Hermione.

'Some do,' said Ron, pouting slightly.

'Only preset phrases. They don't think. They can't be—'

'Bastards?' Harry offered.

Hermione frowned, but nodded. Her eyes fell on the parchment, and her face, once again, fell with them. 'Oh, _Malfoy_!'

'Oh, stuff it! Being dead is depressing enough without your faked sentiments, Granger!'

Ron snorted and turned to Hermione. 'Who the hell would paint a portrait of that prat? He's lying!'

'_I_ would,' said Draco. 'And I'm not. Though conning you wouldn't take much effort, I admit.'

'What? You expect us to believe you painted your own portrait? Yeah, right!'

Harry believed it. Just the sort of thing that prissy sod would do. But Harry wasn't one to impose his beliefs on others. Not unless he was just passing them along.

Harry's mind welcomed the interruption of this particular train of thought by Malfoy, speaking up from halfway under Harry's twitching thumb.

'I'm _quite_ good with a brush, actually. Or,' a strange shadow passed over the parchment, 'I _was_ good at it.'

Ron snorted, and then the past tense of that second sentence hit him, as it had already hit Harry. There was a moment of awkward silence. Then Hermione, ever the knowledge-seeker, said, 'But how—'

'—did I die?' Malfoy finished. '_That_ is what I'm hoping to find out.'

'You don't _know_?' said Ron, eyes wide.

'Of course I don't, you imbecile. Last thing I remember is imprinting my – self on the canvas. That's how it _works_!'

Ron and Harry looked as one towards Hermione, eyebrows rising in unison.

'_Really_, Potter, you and the Weasel should look into whether Granger here is some sort of cerebral vampire, sucking your last remaining braincells out so that she can use you both as mindless sex toys.'

As Ron produced an inarticulate sound of outrage somewhere deep in his throat, Harry purposely ignored the worrying look of interest underlying Hermione's impressive blush of utter mortification.

'Ehm. I. Well. Yes. That's how it – works,' Hermione stuttered, recovering rather too quickly for Harry's liking. 'Usually, the witch or wizard imprints new memories – or brain configurations, really – at regular intervals. But unless he was killed when making the new imprint, the memory of his death would never be copied. It's not a ghost, just a – very complex portrait.'

'So,' said Harry, 'it's not really him, then?'

'Not really, no.'

At this, Ron perked up a bit. 'So he's not even a person? Just a picture?'

'Well,' Hermione hesitated, 'technically.'

'Oh, great set of values there, Granger. You fight for house elves who just think you're crazy for bothering, but you tell me I'm not a person. Thank you very much.'

Ron, utterly unmoved, sniggered. 'And you call me stupid. You haven't even got a brain! Besides, you've always been a loser. Just look at the mess you made of your first little Death Eater job—'

'I was clever enough to outsmart the lot of you,' snapped Malfoy. 'Even with Potter's bloodhound act. I swear, he's like that bloody Black reborn.'

Harry's fingers dug into the parchment. 'Watch it, Malfoy! Parchment's easily ripped!'

'See? Like a rabid, homicidal dog! And _this_ is your Chosen One? Maybe I should shift allegiances again.'

'Maybe you should go to hell in an origami basket.'

'Harry!' cried Hermione, pushed into full pity-the-dead-guy mode by Malfoy's pointed house elf comment.

But Harry wasn't listening. 'Wait a minute. What do you mean, shift allegiances again?'

Malfoy sniffed. 'I hardly expect you to help me out of the goodness of your little Gryffindor hearts, you know. Or, actually,' he frowned, 'I do. But I suppose some sentimental part of me hoped there would be a little Slytherin in you after all.'

Harry leaned closer to the parchment, sneering. 'Wish granted.' His thumb twisted the parchment further. Hermione glared. Malfoy raised an eyebrow.

'I offer you – information.'

'About how it feels to watch paint dry?'

'It's riveting, but no. If you help me find out what happened to me, I'll help you find a way to Voldemort's heart, in the non-figurative sense. Which really, for me, is a win-win situation. I get closure and, through you, revenge.'

Harry blinked. 'Voldemort killed you?'

'Much as I hate to admit it, I think he delegated. But in principle, yes.'

'But,' said Hermione, 'why?'

'As the Weasel so eloquently put it, I made a bit of a mess of things,' drawled Malfoy, and there was a peculiar firmness to the closing of his mouth. There would be no more said on this subject. At least not by him. Harry sighed.

'So you want to help us?'

'Want is such a strong word.'

* * *

'What an extraordinary likeness! It's that pointy-faced Malfoy runt! I say!' exclaimed Horace Slughorn when Harry held up the Malfoy parchment for inspection. 

'You say too much,' snapped Malfoy. 'I'm as tall as Potter and my face is _chiselled_!'

Slughorn bobbed backwards. 'I _say_! It speaks!'

'And thinks before it does so,' muttered Malfoy.

'It's a magical painting,' Hermione filled in, moving up beside Harry. She'd been the one to insist they head for Hogwarts without delay to verify Malfoy's story. Harry and Ron had both agreed, eventually, to brave long-distance Disapparating, the latter to verify Malfoy's death for entirely selfish reasons and the former to prove Malfoy a liar. Harry knew that Malfoy always lied, and tricked, and cheated. This death thing would be no different.

'But,' said Slughorn, squinting at Malfoy, 'that would mean…'

'I've kicked it, yes. And now I can't kick much of anything. I'm not even sure I have any legs.'

'Indeed? How extraordinary!'

'I can see you're all torn up about it.'

Harry turned the parchment around and glared. '_You'll_ be all torn up if you don't keep quiet!'

'Well, well,' Slughorn rubbed his hands together and turned around, ignoring the sniping behind him, 'this must be researched, examined, thoroughly looked into! You've come to the right man, Harry my boy, the right man!'

* * *

'It took my dying to make him notice me,' sniffed Malfoy as Slughorn bounced from shelf to shelf, browsing the massive collection of books that took up most of his Hogwarts workroom. 'How very Slytherin.' 

'_You _never stopped taking notice of _us_,' said Ron, being charged with keeping an eye on Malfoy while Hermione and Slughorn researched and Harry was busy scowling. 'What does that make you? An insane Hufflepuff in Slytherin clothing?'

'He's really just paying attention to me as Potter's tag-along though,' said Malfoy, contemplating the ceiling.

'He does that,' Ron muttered.

'Shut up. I refuse to have anything in common with _you_ … you _commoner_.'

'Feeling's mutual.'

'Now what did I just say? No 'mutual', no 'in common', no 'shared hate'! No abstract nor physical thing shall ever touch the both of us! Get it?'

Ron appeared deep in thought, then said, 'Not if you've got it.'

'There's a good Weasel.'

'Ferret.'

'Same family of small, nasty animals. Too close. You will henceforth refer to me as—'

'Doodle?'

'I hate you.'

* * *

'You're definitely dead,' said Slughorn, sitting in an oversized armchair with Malfoy propped up against a three heavy tomes opposite him. 'There has been no recorded case of a magical painting being animated before the death of its subject.' 

Hermione shifted uneasily on the couch next to Harry whose stomach churned with disappointment that Malfoy hadn't told a lie, because that clearly mattered more than his being actually dead and gone forever save one enervating, perfectly crappy painting.

'You don't say,' drawled Malfoy, and his bored glance was met with steely glares from both Harry and Ron. Slughorn cleared his throat.

'But there was also the matter of your turning up in this particular piece of parchment. Magical paintings of your type can usually only move between paintings featuring the same subject plus, in some cases, others that have been magically linked together. I would certainly love to hear how you managed to find Potter.'

Malfoy blinked. 'I . . . was stuck, for a long while. And then there was an . . . opening. Something else. I went there and found Saint Potter staring down at me. Thought I'd come to Hell at first.'

'Then,' said Slughorn as Harry snorted behind him, 'there's only one explanation.' Hermione leaned forward. 'Your image was already on the parchment.'

'What?' exclaimed Hermione. 'That's not possible! How could Harry have wound up with one of Malfoy's discarded sketches?'

'It would have been a sketch, yes,' said Slughorn, turning to Hermione, 'but anyone could have done it.' His gaze slid over to Harry who couldn't stop the redness creeping up his cheeks.

'I was . . . working out my aggression. I . . . use them for target practice.'

'_Them_?' cried Ron, horrified. 'More than _one_?'

'Well,' mumbled Harry, his eyes accusing the floor of most terrible misdoings.

'You _sketch_ me?'

'_Aggression_.'

'More like _insanity_, you Potty pervert.'

'Still,' said Hermione, more loudly than strictly necessary, 'the important thing is that we can be fairly sure this isn't some trick. And however vile Malfoy is, he can help us.'

Harry and Ron felt moved to protest but were stopped by Hermione suddenly towering over them. 'And we can't waste time bickering!' she concluded.

* * *

As the boys prepared to follow the formidable Hermione into Hell and back, Professor Slughorn called Harry to him. 

'May we speak in private?' Slughorn whispered, casting a glance over Harry's shoulder.

Harry looked down at Malfoy who narrowed his eyes and pursed his lips. 'Granger's already established me as a non-entity. Just keep pretending as if I'm not here and have no feelings or rights whatsoever—' The rest was muffled by crumpling parchment, the swishing of air, and the rather pathetic thud Malfoy made as he hit the back of Ron's head.

'Take him outside and … iron him.'

'Rabid dog!' rang loud and clear through folds of parchment.

'Yes?' said Harry, turning back to Slughorn. He heard the door close behind him.

Slughorn was quiet for a long moment, studying Harry's face in a most disquieting fashion. His forehead wrinkled. Harry squirmed from the waist down, hoping Slughorn would stay focused on his face.

'What are your feelings for the Malfoy boy?' Slughorn asked at long last.

'What? I have no feelings for him! What do you mean?' Harry took two steps back, shoulders hunched, brow creasing.

'You're a powerful wizard, my boy, no questioning that, but to make a magical painting, much less a magical sketch, takes . . . passion.'

'I hate him with a fiery passion.'

Slughorn nodded. 'Funny,' he murmured, 'his features _were_ more chiselled than I remember. Not as pointedly lifelike, or indeed deadlike, as one might have . . . expected. Hm?'

Harry didn't care one bit for the look on Slughorn's bloated face, turned on his heel and stormed out.

* * *

tbc

* * *

A/N: I work as a teacher these days, so I have little time to spend on fanfic. However, I can tell the story if I don't bother too much about editing etc. The (short) chapter above is an example of something written rather quickly and not edited beyond what happens during the writing of draft 0/1. Also, there's a distinct case of 'talking heads syndrome', partly because I'm currently writing a play for one of my English classes (see my Author page if you want to read it).

What I would like to know is: Do you think this is good enough, or should I simply cancel the story? Would you keep reading if this is the kind of material I post?


	3. As if Tomorrow Will Never Come

**3. As if Tomorrow Will Never Come**

'Look, your threats don't bite on me, Potter. And if _you_ bite me, you can kiss the Dark Lord's whereabouts goodbye. Got it?'

'Could you _not_ be an utter nuisance for _one_ minute, Malfoy?'

'A _minute_? I could try a second. Oh, look, it passed. Now say please and buy me a gold frame so expensive it'll make Weasley itch just looking at it.'

'See, this is why I wanted to have this discussion here,' Harry smirked, gesturing vaguely at whatever lurked in the dark corners of his bedroom. 'No one can hear you burn. And I need some light.'

'I tremble in my—' Malfoy stopped, suddenly. His face grew still, and for a moment, Harry thought the magic had run out, that the sketch lived no more. He felt a pang of somethingorother just before Malfoy spoke again, his voice deeper and more monotonous than usual. 'Knockturn Valley. That's what they call it. Stupid nickname that stuck.'

* * *

'Never heard of it,' said Hermione, sitting primly on the sofa in the Weasleys' living-room.

'I can't pronounce its real name,' said Malfoy, 'but it translates as Valley of the Sharp Dark.'

'Sounds lovely,' muttered Harry, slouching by the window and gazing into the darkness outside.

'It is, actually,' said Draco. 'Very picturesque . . . but insanely hard to get to.'

'Have you tried fluttering?' asked Ron, glaring into the fireplace.

'Blowing in the wind?' added Harry.

Hermione sighed. 'Where _is_ this valley?'

'Always did have you pinned as the moderately sane one, Granger. It's in central Europe, part of a mountainous region so large you're sure to miss it.'

Hermione sat up straight, eyes wide. 'The Lost Lands?'

'Lost Lands, Land of the Lost, or even Land of the Free – depends on who you ask.'

'But Wompslerun's Historical Atlas calls the Lost Lands a myth—'

'A rebel's fairytale? A haven for the horrid? A bedtime story for the biggest bastards of the Wizarding world? Yes, that's the one.'

'Look,' said Ron, turning to the little parchment propped up against a pile of books on the coffee table. Backlit by the fire, his hair made him look like a particularly irate fire demon come to torch defenseless parchment people. 'If you're just going to stall with ridiculous stories like that, we might as well burn you now and get it over with.' He reached for the parchment.

'Stop it!' screeched Malfoy. 'Just because you're too thick to recognise the truth, you have no right to burn the messenger!'

Hermione slapped Ron's hand away, but her fire-tinted hair made her look no less a threat as she bent close to Malfoy's pale face. 'You're seriously suggesting there's some big _conspiracy_ to conceal the existence of the Lost Lands? A cover-up so complete that not even I have read about them as anything _but_ myth, even in medieval texts?'

'Bit over-confident, aren't we?' Malfoy sniffed. 'Like, well, _me_, documents can be burnt, shredded, or locked away. And while you are undoubtedly a factoholoic, you've had access to only a certain _kind_ of libraries, haven't you?' He smirked.

'But _why_?' Hermione exclaimed, sitting back and throwing up her hands so roughly she almost sent Malfoy flying.

'Why? Isn't it _obvious_? Would _you_ care to admit that there's a whole country you have no access to? Where wizards and witches who have committed heinous crimes can live in relative safety, because you can _never_ get to them? Where wizards like Voldemort and Grindlewald can amass _armies_ if they're daring enough?'

'Well,' began Hermione, but she got no further before Harry's palm slammed into the window frame.

'DAMN!' he roared into the darkness. 'DAMN THEM ALL! THEY NEED MY HELP BECAUSE OF SOME BLOODY PROPHECY AND STILL THEY KEEP THINGS FROM ME!' He spun around. 'THEY KEEP _COUNTRIES_ FROM ME! FUCKING COUNTRIES!'

From the look on Malfoy's face, he would likely have done as Ron and Hermione if he could: Cowered. Pulled back. Paled till he was white as a bleached ferret.

Harry felt his rage recede as quickly as it had come, pulling all its black tendrils of hate, frustration, fear, and other feelings he didn't care to name into that tight knot inside him that only seemed to grow larger with each passing year. His shoulders sagged. 'So, that's where Voldemort went to recover after killing my parents, right?'

'I,' said Malfoy, clearing his throat, 'would assume so, yes.'

Ron snorted. 'You lying little ferret! If that was true, how come Aurors capture so many Death Eaters? Wouldn't all dark wizards just escape to this fairyland of yours?'

Malfoy's eyes—thick black strokes making it look as though he was wearing eyeliner—narrowed. '_Relative_ safety, Weasel. _Relative_! The Lost Lands are like a very large and infinitely more dangerous version of the Forbidden Forest! The scenery will literally eat you alive. And getting there is no picnic either,' his eyes sought out Harry, 'as you will no doubt discover for yourself. Because I assume you _are_ going?'

Harry hung his head and sighed.

'It's a trap!' Ron exclaimed. 'You can't seriously consider walking right into it!'

Harry didn't answer, except with an even deeper sigh.

'Paranoia suits you, Weasel, but it really makes me want to shove a sharp corner in your eye. So, Potter, are we going or not? Or should I—'

'We're going!'

It took a moment to register, even for Harry, that it hadn't been Harry who had spoken. All eyes turned to the doorway. Well, all eyes that could turn. 'Is that Weasley-who-was-caught-by-a-Veela?'

It was. Bill held onto the doorframe to steady himself. He looked like a particularly nasty and solid shadow of his former self. 'Or at least, _I'm_ going.' He turned to face Harry. 'But if you want He Who Must Not Be Named dealt with, you better come along. I have my own monster to deal with.'

Harry felt he should probably have said something poignant and inspiring at this point, but all that came out was a weak and wavering,

'Sure.'

* * *

Harry awoke to the sound of incessant beeping. He rolled over and slammed his hand onto the overturned piece of parchment next to his alarm. The beeping continued. He patted the parchment a few times more as he pulled himself up to peer at the bedside table. 

'Oh, _sorry_,' he drawled and shut off the alarm with much less force than he'd used moments before. 'My brain registered an obnoxious noise and I just naturally thought of y—' He stopped, blinked, leaned forward and frowned. Something wasn't right. There had been no outcry of unrighteous indignation, not even a muttered 'Bastard'. He poked the parchment. Nothing. 'Fine,' he muttered. 'Be that way.'

When he returned from the bathroom a while later, the motel room was still uncommonly quiet. No demands to be turned over. No supposedly witty remarks, nor any rather odd ones about Harry's half-naked body.

Harry packed, tidied up, and spent too long just sitting on the bed staring at a piece of parchment. For some reason, he was almost afraid to turn it over. No, he _was_ afraid. Of course he was. They were well on their way to the so-called Lost Lands and without Malfoy, they would have come all this way for nothing. But perhaps he should be more irritated than afraid. Perhaps he should just be grateful for a morning _not_ filled with bickering. Perhaps he should extend his arm an inch further and flip over that damn parchment.

There. Was nothing. The parchment was empty, both sides the same. Harry flipped it over again, and again, and again, just to make sure. He grabbed it with both hands and stared hard. The black knot inside him, surprisingly loose, tightened. The parchment remained blank.

Harry was sure some more reasonable part of him was already halfway to Ron's and Hermione's room, which they shared in order to save money, honestly. This reasonable Harry would keep calm and allow no emotion but mild annoyance to surface. After all, Malfoy was worth no more. This reasonable Harry would not find his motel room lonely and cold because a bloody obnoxious picture went missing. He would not even think about other reasons than money to share a room, because even though Ron and Hermione had fought a lot lately, neither of them was a piece of parchment, and only one of them was a boy.

But this actual _unreasonable_ Harry was betrayed by his own mind. With nothing but blank parchment before his eyes, his thoughts could run wild in all kinds of undesirable directions. There was the loss of a guide to Voldemort's whereabouts, but there was also the loss of a presence that had been permanent for over a week now. Still, that should weigh in on the plus side of things, not add to the emptiness. Surely.

'Shit, Potter. You look like crap.'

Harry's gaze focused on a no longer empty parchment just as his hands dropped it to the floor. He bent forward and stared at Malfoy. The tiny face frowned up at him.

'I'll just go back, shall I? Before you stomp on me.'

'Back?'

'Yes, Potter, back. To the place where I was when I wasn't _here_. _Back_.'

Harry blinked. 'You can . . . go places? Then why-'

'Not _places_, you nit. _A_ place. The original painting.' He raised an eyebrow. 'You didn't think _you'd_ somehow managed to tie me to this little doodle of yours, did you? There has to be a proper magical painting, made with charms and whatnot, for any lesser portraits to . . . connect to. Honestly, that Granger person _explained_ this to you.'

'Well, yeah, I suppose,' stuttered Harry, feeling his face heat up, 'but I didn't know you could . . . go back.'

'Yes, well, I can. But I'd rather not.'

'Why?'

At first, it seemed Malfoy would refuse to answer. But then, he looked away and said, once again in that low, cold voice, 'It's empty. An empty studio looking out over an empty lake. And I was . . . trapped there for so long. I thought I would go mad. And here I am, being serious with you, so maybe I did.'

'But then—'

'Why did I go back? Isn't obvious? Given the choice between staring at the dust on a bedside table all night or contemplating the reflection of stars, what would _you_ choose? At least there I don't have to put up with a sadistic keeper who most of the time won't even tell me where we are, much less show me the sights. Takes all the fun out of being,' and here he returned his gaze to Harry, and his eyes were darker than Harry had ever seen them, 'dead.'

That morning was the first time they watched the sunrise together, perfectly quiet as a small Swiss town shifted in pink hues before them.

* * *

'So,' said Ron, gesturing with a precariously ice-cream-filled spoon, 'when is the foldable ferret going to tell us how to actually _find_ this imaginary country?' 

'If it's imaginary,' said Hermione, her jaw clenched and a cup of coffee near the breaking point in her hands, 'then why are you here?'

'Weather's nice,' said Ron, his mouth filled with ice-cream, gesturing around at the crowded, sun-soaked street and outdoors café, 'and someone has to be ready for the trap you're all walking into.'

Bill tapped a finger against the table. 'And you'll save us all using . . . a spoon?'

'Oh,' drawled Malfoy, extra annoyed by having just been wiped clean of ice-cream by one Harry Potter, 'you mean that _isn't_ the weapon of choice for the Weasley clan?'

'We prefer,' said Bill, smiling down at Malfoy, 'not to _have_ a weapon of choice.'

'Which is just another way of saying you'll make do with anything you can get your grubby little hands on?'

'And so live to see another day,' said Bill, still smiling. 'Unlike the ponce who forgot to polish his wand and got distracted.'

There was a moment of quiet. Then someone chuckled. It took Harry another moment to realise that it was Malfoy.

'_Anyway_,' said Hermione, 'Ron does have a point. Where _is_ this secret hideout?'

'I know,' muttered Ron. 'It's hidden in a tiny piece of parchment. Let's throw it away.'

'Let's throw away your ice-cream.' That was, in fact, not Malfoy. It was Hermione, and she meant business. Ron started gobbling up his ice-cream, in silence.

Harry, however, felt that Hermione was being rather too easy on Malfoy, who by all accounts did seem to tell tales as tall as his imaginary mountain range. 'But,' Harry said, 'I've been thinking. There's just not _room_ for these "Lost Lands", is there?'

'It must hurt, using that narrow mind of yours for thinking,' said Malfoy. 'Let's just say the trip from Italy to Africa used to be quite a bit shorter. Made managing the Roman empire a lot easier for a while too.'

'You can't be serious,' said Hermione, real doubt clouding her face for the first time that day.

'Perfectly. The Lost Lands were _founded_ by a Roman. A general - non-magical, would you believe, but with powerful allies - who wanted to escape the empire's wrath and rightly figured that to do that, he'd have to go to a whole new world. Instead of being always on the run in this world, he sent a slice of the empire into a sort of . . . fold in reality, and made it his domain. My kind of coward.'

Hermione had her mouth open and her face was eager as ever, but Harry got in first. 'I thought you'd be of the opinion that he should have fought instead of run away, even though I know you'd _do_ the latter.'

'Unlike others present, I'm no hypocrite. Besides, he stole a _country_. Who wouldn't have run away with _that_?'

'I, for one, especially if it's as nasty as you say it is.'

'Wasn't always that nasty. But it's always attracted a certain _type_ of immigrant.'

'Why is that?' asked Hermione, chin propped in the palm of her hand and eyes wide. 'Did the general _want_ to make it nasty for protection or—'

'No, the place turned bad after his time, when some dark wizards discovered the secret to entering the Lost Lands.'

'And you mean to say no good wizard or witch has ever figured it out?' asked Hermione, sounding both incredulous and rather indignant.

There was a pause. And then that low voice again. 'If they did, they didn't _stay_ good.'

The black knot inside Harry twitched.

* * *

'It involves dark rites, doesn't it?' 

'Something like that.'

The sunset had faded long ago. Harry wasn't sure why he was still on the balcony, or why they had come out there in the first place. He should have been angered enough by Malfoy's cryptic non-answers to leave the latter folded in a pocket, with sand poured in. Instead, they had watched the sunset. They didn't usually, but it had seemed somehow appropriate, more so than a sunrise. They were nearing their point of entry into the Lost Lands, or so Malfoy said. Might as well sleep in, perhaps in the hope that tomorrow might never come.

It didn't seem to be out of spite, that Malfoy said so little on the subject of the Lost Lands. It went against all Harry's expectations, but the silence didn't appear meant to anger him. That was what Malfoy's acerbic wit was for. No, there were other reasons, some more obvious than others.

Though he had resisted it for a long time, Harry had finally allowed himself to consider Malfoy's actual position - dead, stuck in a painting and on a fragile piece of parchment, at the mercy of his enemies. Not his _former_ enemies. Harry understood Malfoy's position better now, but there had still been no talk of Dumbledore's death. No apology, which was good, but also no explanation, which wasn't good at all.

Piecing together a still fragmented picture from silences and offhand comments, Harry had come to see a Malfoy both more pathetic _and_ more human than before. Helped along by brief talks with Hermione, Harry now saw that it was easier to imagine yourself a strong, willing follower than an aristocrat born into serfdom, tied by blood to what always appeared as the losing side from a Hogwarts perspective.

And now he was dead, a drawing, doodled by Harry Potter, and the only thing he had of any worth was his knowledge. Of course he would keep things to himself until the very last moment.

Because he couldn't know that Harry's firm grip on the parchment was not from anger but a fear of Malfoy fluttering away in the wind. Because Malfoy was always there, ready to take Harry's mind off the world with his so-called wit and annoying little ferret face. Because Malfoy was more easily shredded now than back in that bathroom, where he cried in front of ghost larger but no less dead than a piece of parchment.

Because Harry had drawn Draco Malfoy more than once without even realising during those lonely nights in Godric's Hollow, and he needed reminding of just why he despised the little git.

'The wind's increasing,' muttered Malfoy. 'Better not let go. You can't get in without me, you know.'

'I know. Otherwise, I would have shown you how I fold an ugly little airplane.'

'Maniac.'

'_Malfoy_.'

It was meant to be witty, but Malfoy just sighed. They said no more, and the morning came as advertised.


	4. Point of Penetration

**Chapter 4: Point of Penetration**

Clearly, entering an alternate reality involved a whole lot of climbing. Or, at least, struggling up a very steep hillside with a dead guy complaining about sweat in your shirt pocket. Harry wished he had the breath to sigh properly. They were moving through another patch of trees, out of the blazing sun, but the air remained as warm and still as ever, stirred into motion only by their passing and the millions of flies buzzing all around them. They were still avoiding Apparition for fear of detection and for once, Harry really despised doing things the Muggle way. Unlike Malfoy, who for once found it highly amusing. That is, before the sweat. Fortunately, he had stopped chanting 'Potter stinks!' after the first half hour.

'Can't you move any faster, you plebe of profuse perspiration?'

'Can't you think up lame things like that any faster? I _wondered_ what kept you quiet for the last sixty seconds.'

'I was busy drowning.'

'You're a drawing.'

'I was _blurring_!'

'Well, keep doing that then. In silence. You're making my friends avoid me.'

'They're just faster than you. Even the fat cat is faster than you!'

'Bill asked for a _separate room_!'

'So, you _were_ planning to seduce him now that you finally got him away from that mate of his? How tawdry.'

'What? Are you crazy? He's married! And a _man_!'

'Interesting priority there, Potter. As interesting as your heaving pectoral. You're all flustered aren't you? Oh, deary me, little Potty fancies his best friend's older _brother_! How sensational!'

They were out in the open again. The heat made it hard to think. Harry glared, pointlessly, at his shirt pocket as he hurried towards the next clump of trees. 'I don't fancy _him_!'

'Being stressed out makes you stress your sentences oddly, doesn't it?' Malfoy sniggered. 'So, you fancy _someone_, huh? It's the cat, isn't it?'

'Shut,' said Harry, walking into both the shade and Ron's back. He staggered backwards into sunlight, blinked and peered into the darkness. He had to take a few steps forward to make out what Ron and Hermione were staring at. 'Up.'

'Are we there yet?'

'I. Think so.'

The ruin towering above them seemed to grow out of the cliff, and Harry got the feeling it would have broken free and flown away if it weren't for the vines holding it back. It was of mostly Roman design, except for some distinctly gothic decorations, but the sanguine colour of its columns made it look so much more alive than any ruin of its kind Harry had ever seen. Of course, he had only seen them in photos, but he could still tell that this was different. It seemed to announce, with blood-red ferocity, 'The Roman Empire is Not Dead.'

Well, at least it helped him cool down quickly.

* * *

'Oh, honestly, Ron, it's just a corpse! It won't kill you!' 

Hermione poked at the crusted gash in the dead man's throat using two hairpins, muttering something under her breath. Somewhere outside, Ron threw up, again.

The ruin, its interior better preserved than its exterior, was as red inside as outside, though the colour seemed as much a result of dried blood as of paint. Sprayed in all directions from different points throughout the large, column-filled room, the blood had created subtle, radial patterns of shifting hues and ridges.

'It's hardly just _one_ corpse though,' said Bill, moving in and out of view behind the columns as he scanned the walls for legible writing.

'The rest are just skeletons,' said Hermione, apparently losing interest in the corpse spread across central sacrificial altar and moving towards others stacked against one of the columns. 'Though this one is a bit more recent. Don't lick, Crookshanks!'

'So,' said Harry, standing perfectly still close to the exit, 'this is what you wouldn't tell us about?'

'Partly,' said Malfoy who had said hardly anything since their arrival.

'And the other parts would be?'

A pause. 'Granger's probably poking it.'

The chill deepened. 'What?'

'Entering the Lost Lands requires a sacrifice,' said Malfoy, his voice almost a whisper. 'If you haven't . . . murdered before, you must do it here. And the Killing Curses doesn't count. It's too . . . _clean_.'

Hermione and Bill were discussing some partially concealed writing on the wall, but Harry couldn't hear them. 'You mean--'

'I had to do it. As will you, if you're serious about killing the Dark Lord. He'll be too powerful next time he leaves the Lost Lands. You know that.'

Harry knew, of course, that Malfoy was, or had been, a Death Eater. But for some reason the fact that Malfoy hadn't been able to kill Dumbledore had given Harry the idea that he had never killed at all. How stupid. 'So, you murdered someone.'

'Yes.'

'And you think I would . . . _could_ do the same?' asked Harry, trying to keep his voice low.

'There is no other way into the Lost Lands. That's why I didn't tell you before. It's easier to give up when you aren't so very, very close. Isn't it?'

Harry wanted to tear Malfoy to shreds. 'You bastard.'

'Still, if there _is_ another way, I'm sure Miss Superbrain will figure it out. And there are potions. Potions that could make a rabbit tear into a lion. Potions that remove all your inhibitions.'

'We call them drugs.'

'They work.'

If there was one thing Harry had learned over the course of their journey, it was how to decipher Draco Malfoy. 'They drugged you.'

There was no answer, nor really a question, only silence and two shaking sighs.

* * *

'It doesn't make _sense_ that you can only get in through _killing_ someone,' said Hermione, accidentally smacking an errant spider into Ron's face, which was a relief since it stopped him staring a hole in Harry's shirt pocket. 'I mean, yes, the blood might be important for the opening of some sort of passage, and maybe it has to be human blood, but to suggest that the one seeking entrance has to _murder_ someone else - that's just absurd! That may be how they did things in the Middle Ages, but I think we've advanced a bit _beyond_ that! Honestly, it's just to scare people off, I'm sure!' 

Bill put a hand on her shoulder. 'Calm down, Hermione. We'll figure it out, _without_ killing anyone.'

Harry wasn't at all sure he liked the look Bill shot him, or the way his jaw set after he had finished speaking. It implied things Harry would rather not think about. It suggested a bond between them, of grim determination and desperation. It further separated him from Ron and Hermione, who both appeared to subconsciously think this war would be settled by solving puzzles and riddles the way they had so often before.

'But, Malfoy,' said Hermione, somewhat calmer, 'what happened _after_ the . . . sacrifice?'

'I got into the Lost Lands.'

'But _how_?'

'I don't know.'

'What? You have to know _something_!'

'I . . . blacked out, okay?'

Harry thought it was probably just as well that shirt pockets couldn't show emotions very well.

Ron snorted. 'Fainted at the sight of all that blood, eh?'

'At least I didn't throw up.'

Malfoy hadn't mentioned the drugs to the others. Harry hadn't either. Perhaps it would sound too much like an excuse. After all, against all expectation, Ron's and Hermione's dislike for Malfoy was greater than Harry's these days. Or, maybe not their dislike, because Harry still despised the bigoted little bastard, but their _prejudice_. They would just think Malfoy was trying to cover up his dastardly Death Eater deeds, and Bill was so distant these days he would most likely not give a damn either way.

'Well, that's not particularly helpful,' Hermione sighed.

'Ever _so_ sorry.'

'_I'm_ not,' snapped Hermione. 'It would have _helped_ if you'd told us about this sooner!'

'Why? So you could have dragged a helpful book up the mountain?'

'Well . . . _yes_!'

'At least now you'll have a good long while going back to the village to figure out what to do about those human sacrifices.'

'You . . . you beastly little manipulative . . .'

'Uhm. Hermione.' Ron tapped her shoulder. He looked more worried than angry. Harry could see that clearly. Too clearly.

'. . . Death Eater!'

'It's getting lighter,' said Ron, and it was. The walls were glowing as if lit by invisible torches.

'That's odd,' said Bill, moving towards the nearest wall.

Hermione looked completely at a loss. 'I don't under--'

'What's going on?' asked Malfoy, a distinct note of urgency in his tone.

'I don't know,' muttered Harry, moving towards the sacrificial table. Was it just the light, or was the corpse moving? And if it was, why on Earth was he moving towards it?

'There's something moving behind the columns!' exclaimed Ron, pointing in a directionless sort of way at the flickering lights.

Harry could see nothing moving. It was only the light. It set everything in false motion, even the on closer inspection still unmoving corpse. Harry sighed and looked up from the gruesome sight to find his gaze stuck on something potentially even more disturbing. Patches of brighter light were moving _away_ from the far wall, coming closer. They were starting to take on shape, starting to _walk_.

Harry's hand moved almost on its own to his shirt pocket and pulled up the parchment. 'What the hell are those?' he asked, still staring straight ahead.

'They're,' stuttered Malfoy, 'they're . . . not supposed to come _yet_! They're-- There's been no sacrifice!'

'But, what _are_ they?' asked Hermione from somewhere behind Harry.

There were four shapes. No, wait, five. Four large and one smaller. Two of the man-sized ones were still very indistinct, unlike their movement pattern as they split from the other two. They were prowling, Harry realised, and yet he remained glued to the spot, his eyes fixed not on the shape with shimmering hair both flowing from its female head and bristling across its body, but on the being heading straight towards _him_. For each second that passed it looked more and more like a young man, fair-haired, slender yet toned, and attractive in a way that chilled Harry to the very bone. Malfoy's shouted warning barely registered at first.

'THEY'RE GUARDIANS! RUN! RUN _NOW_! BLOODY MOVE!' It amazed Harry that there could be so much voice in such a tiny piece of parchment. Then he spun around, with every intention of running.

To his left, an implausible, lurching arrangement of tentacles, claws, fangs and fur was assaulting a screeching Hermione. In front of him, Ron struggled towards Hermione while a giant spider plunged its stingers into his back. To his right, Bill was being attacked, or perhaps violently fondled, by a golden female werewolf. From behind him, strong arms encircled his waist and a warm tongue slid up the side of his neck.

Harry broke free, took one step forward, and tripped. A hand grabbed his thigh, hauling him backwards. Dust blinded him. There was screaming everywhere. His left hand searched for something to hold onto. His right hand clung tighter to Malfoy than ever before, even when his assailant flipped him over and Harry's elbow slammed against the stone floor.

His vision cleared, enough for him to see the young man, stark naked, straddling him and leaning close, closer, closer. The kiss was ferocious. Harry's head slammed against the floor.

Disoriented, Harry pushed the man away, rolled over and started to scramble away across the floor. He felt something tugging at his trousers. Malfoy was shouting something incoherent from inside Harry's cramped fist.

Too late, Harry realized that his holding onto the sacrificial table only made it easier for the young manbeast to tear off his trousers. His t-shirt, already torn against the table's foundation, was next. Hot, sweaty skin, hands, nails, tongue, teeth replaced the discarded clothes. Sand scraped against Harry's naked back. He was sure he would black out any second.

Black out.

Malfoy!

No.

No, no, no!

The beast, the beautiful monster, was too strong. Malfoy kept shouting, shouting, screaming. Harry held on. Hanging on to Malfoy was all that made _him_ hang on, hang in there, stay semi-conscious.

There was roaring, bellowing, fire, and smoke behind him. When the cacophony died down, there were no more screams, only whimpers from inside Harry's fist, grunting and whimpering to his left, and sounds from himself that he did his very best to block out.

His mind clouded by pain and repressed sensations, Harry noticed other sounds, growing stronger. Heavy breathing, swishing, claws against stone.

Then there was a moment of stillness, blankness, and when the world stopped spinning, there was a dinosaur peering down at him. Like something out of Jurassic Park, though the fire that exploded from its nostrils suggested it was more dragon than dinosaur.

When his detached thoughts caught up with events, Harry was already on fire. He screamed, staggered to his feet and tried to somehow spin off the flames licking his skin.

It didn't make sense. He was naked, and yet the flames danced across his sweat-soaked skin without harming it at all. The pain, however, was excruciating.

Running out of air, Harry could scream no longer, and yet the scream went on. Despite the raging flames, Harry stilled, turned his head and stared at his fist. The edges of the parchment were on fire. Malfoy was burning, and shouting something. Harry drew his fist up to his face.

'I CAN'T SEE! CAN'T SEE IT! IT'S NOT THERE!' shouted Malfoy, and Harry could see and feel that the fire was eating its way into the parchment still inside his hand. 'MY PAINTING! IT'S NOT _THERE_!'

The realisation that Malfoy was trapped and burning came as such a shock that Harry barely registered the bipedal dragon herding him backwards until he stepped into cold, white light. The fire immediately began to die down everywhere except where it still had the parchment to feed on. Harry felt as if he'd been thrown into an icy lake, down to the sensation of fluid against his skin and a feeling of weightlessness.

The last thing he heard before blacking out was Malfoy's piercing howl of terror.

The last thing he saw was his fist slackening and the parchment going up in flames.

The last thing he felt was neither pain nor cold, but sorrow.

* * *

For a brief moment, before a stinging raindrop hit his left eye, Harry stared into a dark and cloudy sky. He shivered and felt long, wet grass rub against his back and brush against his arms, legs, and neck. Slowly, painfully he sat up and surveyed his surroundings. 

Straight ahead, a short way up the gently sloping hillside, there was a massive wall of what looked like dirty ice, a slowly melting glacier. How far it extended in either direction, Harry couldn't tell. Beyond the small clearing where he sat, there were massive, looming fir trees all around.

To his left lay Bill, still unconscious. The older man was, like Harry, completely naked. He also had not a hair left on his body, anywhere. Harry felt his own forehead, and further up. Hiding the scar would undoubtedly be a problem, but he found himself not caring much, about anything.

Then he felt an odd roughness against his scalp, and realised he was using his right hand. There were streams of sooty rain running down his arm, and his palm, when he finally managed to force it in front of his face, was the colour of mourning. Malfoy was gone.

The intense feeling of loss deepened as Harry, now reminded of those who were not there, frantically scanned the clearing for any sign of Hermione or Ron. Though he already knew he had lost them too. He just knew. There had been no more screams.

Two had entered the Lost Lands, and two had not. Two for two. No, it couldn't be. Had there been blood? He didn't know.

Staying conscious was painful. Remembering was painful. _Sitting_ was painful. Harry sank back into the cold grass, quivered and curled up in a fetal position. Thunder rolled, as did the tears down his cheeks.

* * *

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